Painted World
by Aima D. Duragon
Summary: It was an odd thing, living in a Horcrux. Tom had studied them a great deal before he'd finally embarked upon creating them, but none of the old tombs he'd uncovered had mentioned that the severed pieces of his soul would retain a form of consciousness. Nothing he'd ever heard had said that he would remain awake inside the void.


**QLFC Round 13**

 **Prompt:** Write about a character being manipulated

 **Optional Prompt(s):**

7\. Royalty

8\. Steel grey

12\. Desire

Extra: pawn

 **A/N:** This is pretty much CoS from Tom's POV. Sort of. I honestly haven't seen/read it in a while! This is probably my last fic for the QLFC competition (I don't think we have a shot at making it into the finals), and I just wanted to say that it's been great! If anyone is on the fence about trying a competition like that, my vote is: go for it. You'll learn a lot and meet some cool folks along the way. So thanks, QLFC! It's been great!

 **Word Count:** ~2650

* * *

It was an odd thing, living in a Horcrux.

Tom had studied them a great deal before he'd finally embarked upon creating them, but none of the old tombs he'd uncovered had mentioned that the severed pieces of his soul would retain a form of consciousness. Nothing he'd ever heard had said that he would remain awake inside the void. Then again, maybe his piece was just different. He supposed he could only speculate about the others.

And speculate he did. Constantly. There was little else for him to do.

Needless to say, living inside of a diary was not the most exciting of existences.

When he'd first "awoken", he'd existed as nothing but a phantom, lost amongst endless shadow. His world had been vast and empty, made of nothing save for the absence of light. Time had meant nothing to him beyond endless terror. He'd felt lost and helpless, like a pebble thrown into a vast ocean.

Fortunately, he had retained his memory. And his magic.

He'd figured out how to give himself form; how to paint colors on his endless, black world and give its edges enough texture to make it look and feel real. Or at least, as real as he could remember.

He'd been meticulous. He'd had the time to be.

The Chamber had been the first thing he painted. He wasn't sure why. But he had a feeling it was the same reason that he'd painted himself as he'd been at sixteen. Something about it just felt right. Those colors had felt the most vivid.

He spent most of his time in the Chamber, amusing himself with detailing its pipes and serpentine structures. There were must worse prices to pay for immortality than eternal boredom, he supposed.

Occasionally, he could still manage to catch glimpses of the outside world, but most of the time it took more energy than he had at his disposal. Being a fragment of a soul had come with its limitations.

So he'd made himself content in his painted world. He'd made himself accept that this existence of his was a necessary evil. No matter how much he grew to hate it.

* * *

The first time he heard it, he was sitting in the Chamber on the giant head of one of the basilisk statues, his legs dangling idly over its nose as he added shimmer to the lines of its scales.

 _Dear Diary, my name is Ginny Weasley and I am eleven years old._

Tom's hand paused as the voice echoed softly through the room, like a ripple on an otherwise still lake. It made the Chamber vibrate softly, the image of it wavering in the dark. He looked around, curiosity plucking at his heartstrings. He'd never heard a voice before. And something about it sounded achingly... _real_. He waited for it to sound again, but the silence that had settled around him held firm.

Frowning, he opened his mouth to speak, only to find his voice hollow and empty. It had been a while since he'd used it. With a gesture, he textured his throat and colored the timbre of his voice. "Hello?"

He didn't have to wait long. The response was almost immediate.

 _Oh, wow. I'm sorry. I didn't know this was that kind of diary. Hello._

Tom stood, trying to figure out where exactly the voice was emanating from. It sounded as if it was coming from all around him — pouring out of the very walls — high pitched and girlish. "I'm not sure what you mean," he said.

 _The kind that talks back. I feel a bit bad now. I thought mum had just gotten me a journal. I know these types of things can be very expensive..._

Things? Despite himself, Tom's teeth clenched. He didn't understand what was happening. How had this _child_ come into possession of his Horcrux?

"What did you say your name was?"

 _Ginny Weasley. Well, Ginevra Weasley actually, but everyone calls me Ginny._

Weasley. The name didn't ring any bells. "Muggle-born?"

 _Uh...no._

Odd. He'd always prided himself on knowing all of the pureblood family names.

 _Does that matter?_

"Of course not," Tom lied.

 _That's good. Do you have a name?_

Expelling a needless breath, Tom closed his eyes. He didn't have the energy necessary to be using the kind of magic that "seeing" required, but he didn't have a choice but to chance it. He needed to know what kind of situation he'd been thrown into.

A shadowy room swam into focus, bathed in swaths of crimson and gold. Gryffindor crests accentuated nearly every corner, gaudy and self-righteous as ever. A small girl with red hair, blue eyes, and far too many freckles was staring down at him, her lips curled into a smile.

All too soon, the doors of the Horcrux slammed in around him, leaving him with a dull ache in his chest; the place where his soul should be.

"My name," Tom said, his vision still reeling, "is Tom Riddle."

* * *

He learned the rules of interacting quickly. There weren't many of them.

1\. He did not have the ability communicate first.

2\. He did not have the ability to communicate his thoughts. The only things the Weasley girl could hear (or see?) were the words he spoke aloud.

3\. He did not have the ability to read the Weasley girl's thoughts (though he doubted she had many worth reading). Her only form of communication with him came via what she scribbled into his diary.

It was an odd sort of arrangement. He was acutely aware that she believed him to be nothing more than a harmless charm, and he was content with letting her continue to believe that. However, despite receiving a reprieve from the endless silence, Tom found the girl ceaselessly daft and annoying. More than once, he'd ignored her vapid presence in favor of his painting.

But that was before he'd noticed.

Every time she spoke to him he felt...stronger. More solid. More real. He began remembering colors that he'd forgotten existed.

Somehow, she was pouring bits of her soul into him. And daft and annoying though Ginny Weasley was, her soul was exquisite. Beautiful and whole and — Merlin — how he _wanted_ it. He hadn't realized how deep the void inside of him was until he'd tasted it; felt its lovely effervescence like a live thing inside of him. It was a guiding light in the midst of the surrounding dark.

He wondered just how much of it he could get from her. He wondered how difficult a soul was to coax into submission.

 _Tom?_

Tom smiled. "I'm here."

 _Hi. I've had the most horrible day._

Drop by drop, the light began trickling in. "Tell me all about it."

* * *

 _Do you think I'm interesting?_

"I think you're beautiful."

Tom has never felt much in the way of sentiment, but during his school years, he'd been forced to perfect the emulation of it. It was a craft he'd spent years honing, and there had been few who could withstand the final outcome. The Weasley girl was no exception.

 _That's nice of you to say, but really, I'm not._

Day after day she practically begged him to stroke her ego, and he was more than happy to comply. "Yes, you are. You're like a flower in bloom, honey-sweet and incomparably soft. Anyone who doesn't think so is an idiot."

The light of her soul began trickling in faster. Tom ran his fingers through it and felt something achingly akin to a shudder vibrate through him. His desire to consume it was an untamable force.

 _You're just saying that. You've never even seen me._

"Not true!" The feigned whimsy in Tom's voice reverberated off the light, crystallizing and refracting it like a chandelier. "Flaming red hair. Doe eyes as blue as Forget-Me-Nots. Skin like dusted porcelain. Dear lady, you are royalty living amongst peasants."

 _I don't know what half of that means, but it sounds lovely._

Tom sniggered.

 _You're so nice, Tom. I wish everyone was as nice as you. I feel like most people don't even know I exist. Especially Harry._

Harry. That name was like the tip of a quill dragging up Tom's spine. Recognition curled in the back of his mind like smoke. "Harry? Is he a boy you like?"

 _Yeah. He's just so great. I mean, he's so nice to everyone even though he's practically a celebrity._

"He's famous?"

 _He's Harry Potter._

That same prickle raked up Tom's bones and an instinctive snarl maimed his lips. For a moment, his world went black as rage bloomed through him.

 _Wait, have you not heard of him?_

The Chamber flickered back into view, pale and muted. "Can't say that I have."

So she told him. She told him everything.

* * *

Tom wasn't sure he'd ever known true anger before now. It filled him. _Consumed_ him. It had started leaking out into his paints — bleeding his world with hues of black and red that even the Weasley girl's soul couldn't illuminate.

Because somehow — impossibly — he'd failed. Or a version of him had failed; the version that had been allowed to continue on in the outside world while he was stuck in here wasting away with no one but an eleven-year-old girl for company.

He needed to get out. He needed to rectify the misconception that he'd been destroyed. He was Lord Voldemort! How dare they believe that a mere _child_ had killed him!

Vision swimming, Tom made his way over to the steady stream of soul light that fell through the Chamber's center. He ran his fingers through it, watching the golden liquid bead across his skin before slipping to the floor below.

Perhaps it was time to remind everyone exactly who he was. Perhaps it was time for the Heir of Slytherin to return.

* * *

 _How old are you, Tom?_

"Older than I look," Tom answered honestly. Honesty, he'd found, was one of the most useful tools when it came to deception. It was the queen that everyone mistook for a pawn.

 _You just look like a bunch of yellow pages and black ink to me._

"Do I? Well if I was standing right in front of you, how do you imagine I'd look?"

Silence hung around him for a moment, and the stream of light flickered nervously. Over the past couple of days, it had started to take form; the barest outline of a young girl's figure. Idly, Tom ran his finger along the space where her throat would be.

 _I imagine you'd be very handsome. With dark hair and pale eyes. You'd wear glasses too, maybe. Tall and lean. You'd be beautiful without even trying._

Tom grinned, wrapping the full width of his hand around the figure's gleaming throat. "Nowhere near as beautiful as you."

Again, the golden figure flickered.

"Would you kiss me?" he asked, his voice a velvet purr. He wondered if she could tell. Judging by the pleasant hum of her soul, he rather thought she could.

 _Yes_ , she whispered reverently. _Would you kiss me?_

Tom leaned towards the figure, as if he meant to do just that. "Oh, yes," he replied, once again giving his honest answer. "I would devour you if I could."

* * *

The first time he found himself in possession of the Weasley girl's body was a wild rush. It didn't last long, but, oh, the _feeling_ of it...

He'd forgotten what it was like to have a body; to exist in a world of weight and density. He'd breathed in and _tasted_ the air.

He'd been slammed back into his diary barely a moment later, his body still vibrating with the echoes of sensation.

It was possible. He could be real again.

He could find this Harry Potter...and destroy him.

* * *

 _Tom? Are you there?_

"Always, for you."

 _I'm just...having kind of a rough day._

"Are you?"

 _Yeah. I don't know what it is. I just...feel strange. Really tired and not all there. And I keep having nightmares._

Tom tilted his head. The golden figure was starting to gather color now. The outline of her hair was like a brush of flame against the dim backdrop of the Chamber. He carded his fingers through it and felt its power rush through him in a heady wave.

"What sort of nightmares?"

The figure shuddered. _It's hard to stay. I don't really remember them. I can only remember how they make me feel. Scared. And like something is following me. I know it sounds stupid..._

"It doesn't sound stupid at all," Tom said. "I wish I could be there to help you."

 _Don't be silly. You do help me._

"But I wish I could actually be there. To hold you." His finger moved to the swell of the figure's cheek. "To wipe away your tears."

Silence stretched through the Chamber. _But that's not possible, right? I mean, you're not real...right?_

Tom released a breath that he could almost feel. "Oh, darling, I'm as real as you want me to be."

* * *

He walked through the moonlit halls of Hogwarts, breathing in the midnight air. The Weasley girl's legs were far too short for his liking, but it was a temporary discomfort. He was real and free.

The world was an object within reach.

He made his way through the familiar halls, into the second-floor girls lavatory. Familiar, blubbering cries echoed off the tile, but Tom doubted that the girl would dare interrupt him again. His presence was not something she would likely forget, even in death.

The entrance to the Chamber looked exactly as he'd painted it in his diary, but nothing he'd ever painted compared to the slick feel of real porcelain beneath his palm, or the way candlelight reflected off the snake's steel-grey scales. His heart beat a little harder in his chest.

" _Open_."

The Chamber obeyed.

* * *

 _Tom, I'm so scared._

"I know you are. It's going to be alright."

 _You say that, but you don't know. Someone's been petrified._

Her golden figure was almost fully formed now; so solid that he could barely see through it. Her soul was such a lovely, vibrant thing, and so very close to belonging to him. "I'll keep you safe."

 _But how can you? You're just a diary._

Tom grinned malevolently. He was the one making the rules now. "Close your eyes."

 _What? Why?_

"Just close your eyes, and think of nothing but me."

Hesitance quivered through her figure, but Tom felt her comply. He could feel a lot that she did now. It was like being able to feel his own shadow.

"Good," he purred, watching her form solidify even further. With a wave of his hand he banished the backdrop of the Chamber, trading it for a smaller room, drawn with soft lines and colored in soothing pastels. "Good."

Golden light turned to pale flesh as Ginny Weasley blinked. She stared at him for a long moment, her eyes large. "Tom?" The sound of her own voice made her jump.

He cloaked himself in his most alluring smirk, like a wolf hiding its fangs. "Yes."

"But I—how? This isn't—I—I must be dreaming."

"Are you?" Tom stepped forward, raising his hand and painting warmth against her cheek.

She gasped against him, flushing as only a little girl could. Her innocence was enough to make his stomach turn.

"Tom." Tears began welling beneath her irises.

"I know you're scared," he said. "But I can protect you."

"I—I don't understand"

He swiped away one of her tears with the pad of his thumb. "Nothing can hurt you while you're here with me. If you're ever scared, all you have to do is close your eyes and think of me. I can keep you safe, Ginny."

She looked up at him, her gaze so foolishly trusting. The warmth of her soul was pouring itself into him in earnest now, infecting him with life. Reality was so close he could almost taste it. He would finally be free of this ugly, black world.

"Do you promise?" Ginny asked.

Tom leaned down until she shivered from the proximity of him. "Ginevra Weasley, I will protect you if it's the last thing I do."


End file.
